Ophelia Adrift by Helen Goltz

blushing. It was a new kind of pain—different from the pain of losing my parents, but still a feeling of separation and I don’t know, anticipation maybe.
    “I miss you too, Jack,” I whispered. “You’re taking up all my headspace.”
    He laughed. “I’m not keeping you up at night though,” he said, softening his backhanded insult.
    “It’s because you kept me up the night before that I couldn’t stay awake!” I defended myself. “I’m only human.”
    “Yes, you are,” he said.
    I looked into his eyes and saw something there—surprise, trepidation—something unexpected.
    “Tonight?” he asked. He didn’t touch me despite standing in my space.
    Behind me my name was called and I spun around to see a football hurtling towards me. I flinched and then Jack was there, caught it and returned it just as quickly.
    “Got to go,” he said, and turned the corner of the building before I could say anything. I looked around and I was alone.
    Chayse called out. “You okay, Ophelia?”
    I nodded and disappeared back into the building. I didn’t need the cavalry coming to the rescue. I was back at my easel within minutes.
    I could feel Holly looking at me, her hand suspended over her painting, blue acrylic paint on the end of the brush waiting to be applied.
    “Are you alright, you look like you’ve seen a ghost?” she asked.
    I nodded. “Fine, just something I ate maybe.”
    “Or something you didn’t,” she said. “Lunchtime, you’re going to conquer a sandwich!” She turned back to her painting and started dabbing the blue paint into her almost completed sky in the Jeffrey Smart imitation painting.
    I sighed. It was nice to have friends that cared but what was Jack doing at my school and how did he get to that football so quickly? Why did I feel like he was reading my soul when no-one else had reached that depth. Freaky.

 
    Chapter 11
     
    OPHELIA
     
    Adam went to bed first, then Uncle Seb and the dogs—I thought they never would! I watched as eventually, the light spilling out from under their doorways disappeared. I didn’t check to see if Jack was there for me on the beach—on our rock—I just wanted to be there. I grabbed my jacket and slipped it around my jeans and pullover. It was a cold night, even chillier when the sea spray hit me. The front door resisted me opening it; Uncle Seb said it swelled and tightened with the salt air. I looked upwards at the ceiling asking for permission and the house gave in and let me out. I quietly closed the door behind me and bolted across the road to the beach.
    The cool sand felt wonderful as my toes dug in. I didn’t look too far out to sea—the thought of what might lie beneath terrified me. But when it came to meeting Jack, I didn’t feel any fear, just the opposite. My heart was playing its own beat, the ocean breeze made me feel alive and awake for the first time in months and soon, he would be here.
    Then I saw him. He was sitting on the rock, our rock, where he had led me the first night we met. It looked like he commanded the ocean from there, the moon placed squarely in front of him, the waves lapping the rock in gentle adoration. Then he turned to face me and a slow smile spread across his face. Was he ever in doubt I would come?
     
    JACK
     
    I hated that I needed to see her. I haven’t had that before, I’ve always been in charge and ... well it doesn’t matter, but with her it is different. I sensed it right from the start. I felt her presence before I saw her, and turning, saw she was there watching me. I rose and went down the rock to meet her.
    “You came,” I said.
    She blushed and smiled, her hair floated on the ocean breeze and her eyes were as full as the moon, pale blue, too large for her little face. I extended my hand to her and she placed her hand in mine. I guided her up the rocks to our spot. She was a sure-footed climber, but I felt her eyes boring into me, studying me.
    “We won’t get washed away here, will